1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to telephony and data communications networks, and in particular, the present invention relates to a system which flexibly and efficiently delivers targeted promotional messages to end-user subscribers, preferably based on profiles, preferences and/or interests. Herein, promotional messages include advertisements, public service announcements, surveys, and the like, delivered in audio, video and/or graphic formats.
2. Description of the Related Art
End-users (telephone and computer network subscribers) have historically paid network access and/or usage-based fees to carriers in exchange for the ability to communicate with other end-users. More recently, however, systems have been proposed which enable end-users to receive free and/or subsidized telephone-based communications services in exchange for listening to promotional messages provided by third party sponsors. These systems, however, lack the sophistication and functionality needed for broad cost-effective application in large complex markets. Morever, such systems, having been designed to carry out the message selection (targeting) process at the front end of, or during, each call, may suffer from reduced performance (delays caused by processings at the time of the call) or increased costs (due to the need for additional in-house processing requirements). Such limitations are amplified under wide scale deployment.
In order to reduce processing requirements at the front-end of, or during, each call, one or more systems classify subscribers according to common (or shared) characteristics. When targeting messages, all subscribers within a given class are treated the same, i.e., all subscribers within a given category will be targeted as a group. While this approach does, in fact, simplify and streamline the processing requirements, it also inhibits the ability of such systems to resolve individual subscribers due to the aggregation of subscribers into common classifications. It also imposes added complexity as the number of targeting parameters increases, since each subscriber may belong to more than one classification or category. The net effect is to limit the precision with which a sponsoring party may target messages with little, if any, gain in process efficiency. This is a severe limitation in existing system designs given that virtually all consumer oriented industries are trending from market or segment-focused marketing and advertising toward customer or individual-focused marketing and advertising. A drawback of existing systems thus resides in the inability to resolve individual subscribers.